VEHICLES AFFECTED

Further information is available at toyota.com, lexus.com, at Toyota customer service at (800) 331-4331 or at Lexus customer service at (800) 255-3987.

HOW THE RECALL WILL WORK

• Toyota will send recall notices to owners of the Lexus ES 350, Camry and Avalon by the end of the year. Notices to owners of the other models will start in 2010.

• Starting in January, owners will bring their cars to Toyota dealerships for modification. A company official was unable to say how long owners can expect their vehicles to be in the shop.

• Toyota has not announced whether it will provide loaner cars or make other accommodations while the changes are made.

Paving the way for a mammoth recall, Toyota yesterday announced it will modify gas pedals and make other changes on more than 4 million of its popular cars and trucks to remedy potential sudden acceleration problems.

By year’s end, the automaker will begin directly notifying vehicle owners about the nationwide recall, which involved recent model years of the Camry, Avalon, Prius, Tacoma, Tundra and three Lexus models.

Owners have already been asked to remove the driver-side floor mat to avoid entrapping the gas pedal.

The automaker didn’t offer an estimate of how much the recall will cost Toyota. Reports in Japan have put the price tag at more than $5 billion. Some critics are also saying this recall might not solve the problem, which they believe involves the vehicles’ electronic systems.

According to a preliminary report by the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, the recent high-speed crash in Santee that killed California Highway Patrol Officer Mark Saylor and three members of his family was apparently caused when the pedal was entrapped by a floor mat. Saylor was driving a loaner Lexus ES 350.

The deaths in August brought national attention to an acceleration problem that has dogged the world’s largest automaker for years.

In January, the automaker will offer to shorten the pedal by three-quarters of an inch and give it more rounded edges as a temporary remedy. New pedals will be installed by dealers beginning in April.

For the Lexus ES 350 and Toyota’s Camry and Avalon models, Toyota will replace the Styrofoam padding under the floor carpet with thinner material and install a brake override system. Toyota said owners of those models would be the first to receive notification because the vehicles are believed to have the highest risk for pedal entrapment.

The new brake system will cut the power in case of a sudden acceleration incident in which the pedal and brakes are pressed simultaneously. Toyota plans to make the brake override system standard equipment throughout the Toyota and Lexus lineup by the end of 2010.

Toyota spokesman Brian Lyons said changing the shape and size of the pedal and padding will allow more space between the pedal and the floor, preventing the accelerator from being trapped by an ill-placed mat.

He said the automaker came up with the remedy after extensive testing and in consultation with federal transportation officials on the possible underlying causes of a stuck gas pedal.

“It addresses the root cause,” he said. “Period.”

Highway safety experts called the move a good first step, but said not all incidents of sudden acceleration can be explained by the configuration of the pedal, padding and mat. They believe faulty electronics may also play a role.

“This problem is not going to go away for Toyota until they find all the causes of sudden acceleration,” said Clarence Ditlow, with the Center for Auto Safety in Washington, D.C., a consumer safety group.

Sean Kane, president of Safety Research & Strategies, a consulting firm that works with the auto industry and the government, cited cases of sudden acceleration in which misplaced floor mats were ruled out as a cause.

But Lyons said there is no indication faulty electronics were behind the incidents. In one recent case in Minnesota involving a Lexus ES 350, government officials probed the car’s electronic controls and found no evidence they were to blame.

“This has been investigated thoroughly over the years and we have not found a defect with the engine control system,” Lyons said.

Since 2002, the government has attributed at least five deaths and two injuries to floor-mat-related unintended acceleration in the Toyota vehicles and has received reports of more than 100 incidents in which the accelerator may have become stuck. A Massachusetts-based safety consultant who has investigated the Toyota cases, however, has found more than 2,000 incidents involving 16 deaths and 243 injuries potentially tied to the Toyota gas pedals.

Karen Aldana, a spokeswoman with the federal highway safety agency, said yesterday that human error can also be a factor.

She said the agency is pleased with Toyota’s remedy, adding that federal authorities will continue to monitor the issue and conduct tests. They could impose additional vehicle modifications.

Lyons said Toyota is still formulating the logistics of the recall, the largest of its kind in U.S. history. The automobile recall will rank among the top five in U.S. history. The biggest: Ford’s recall of 14.3 million vehicles, over various years, to repair cruise-control switches.

Lyons was unable to estimate the overall cost of the recall. Toyota officials have denied published reports in Japan that the company has set aside more than $5 billion for the work.

It was unclear yesterday whether Toyota would provide loaner cars or make other accommodations while the modifications are made.

Members of the Saylor family declined to comment yesterday.

The CHP officer and Chula Vista resident died after his loaner Lexus crashed after driving off state Route 125 at Mission Gorge Road. The vehicle was reportedly moving at 120 mph.

Also killed were his wife, her brother and the Saylors’ 13-year-old daughter.